Student Questionnaire

My name is Dan. I got 12 GCSE grades A-C including B’s in English and English Literature. I got my only A in History. I spend most of my time listening to music, playing sports or with friends.

Print Media:
I don’t regularly read newspapers but I will try to read an article if I am told there is something interesting in it. I have never taken to reading newspapers because I have limited access to them. I don’t look at magazines for the same reason.

Radio Media:
I used to listen to several radio shows on Virgin Radio. I listened to The Geoff Show and The Sunday Night Show with Iain Lee almost every week. After the radio station changed its name to Absolute Radio and the times of the radio programmes, I listened to them less frequently until I stopped completely. I tend not to listen to any other radio stations as I don’t really like the music played.

Music Industry:
I have a very wide taste in music genres but I mainly listen to post-grunge, symphonic metal and melodic metalcore. I used to play guitar and drums but I stopped as I didn’t think was good enough to be in a band. I get most of my music through Spotify, Youtube or CDs bought online. I think that downloading music illegally from the internet is a waste of time as the sound quality is usually terrible and it can take a long time to download or let a virus onto your computer. I believe that the music industry can affect some peoples attitudes and aspirations positively or negatively.

Video Games:
I don't have a specific favourite but I do enjoy playing Uncharted and Uncharted 2. The games use of long, cinematic scenes give it a sense of being as much about the story as it is about the gameplay. It also includes various comedic references and scenes, as well as the main character making sarcastic comments throughout gameplay if the player makes a mistake.

Most action-based video games are about a man who who has to use a lot of violence to solve his problems. Some activists think that violent video games should be banned because of stories that surface about "a troubled teenager who goes on a murderous rampage and then blames it on a video game". I think blaming violence on video games is a cheap way of excusing the someone who has done something wrong and then tried to think of a way to get out of the punishment. For the majority of people, playing video games actually allows them to release feelings that could potentially cause social problems.

New Technology:
A large amount of new technology available globally has allowed the entire world to come together and lets people keep up with news, friends and family even when they are hundreds or thousands of miles away. Technology lets me do many things. It lets me keep in contact with family members who live far away and friends if I haven't seen them for a while. I often use BBC iPlayer or 4oD to catch up on any tv programmes that I have missed and use Spotify to listen to music.

Television:
My favourite TV channels are BBC1, Virgin1, Sky1, Bravo and Sky Sports News. I think that the first four have several interesting programmes while SSN allows me to keep up with everything in the sporting world. My favourite TV genres are comedy panel shows and sitcoms because I tend to watch TV to wind down. However, I find that no shows are able to to keep me interested in the long term as I can't think of any shows that I would call memorable.

Feature Film:
While I tend to watch mostly comedy or action films, I think it is because I watch films based on who is in them rather than what critics say about them. A film that I consider as one of the best ever is Die Hard. It is an action film that took two relatively unkown actors (Bruce Willis and Alan Rickman) and catapulted them into stardom and resulted in both of them appearing in several major films over the last 20 years. The film is set in a skyscraper on Christmas Eve that is besieged by a group of German terrorists, led by Hans Gruber (Rickman) who want to steal the millions of dollars of bearer bonds inside a virtually uncrackable safe. Unbeknownst to them, NYC cop, John McClane (Willis), is also in the building. As he tries to inform the authorities of the threat, he is discovered and chaos ensues as the terrorists try to capture McClane, he tries to kill all of the terrorists and the bumbling police/FBI team outside try to resolve the conflict. The film also contains many features now considered classics, such as the main characters catchphrase "Yippee kai yay, motherf***er" and Gruber's slow motion fall from the building. The film contains many uses of music, diegetic and non-diegetic, to enhance the scene. For example, Ode To Joy, the classical piece by Beethoven, is used as a recurring theme for Gruber and his associates. Also, as the film is set around the christmas period, sleigh bells are used throughout as well as Winter Wonderland and Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!

Another film that I would call a classic is Some Like It Hot. The 1959 film stars Tony Curtis, who unfortunately died shortly before finished writing this, Jack Lemmon and Marilyn Monroe. It is about a pair of struggling musicians who witness a gang murder, similar to the St. Valentines Day Massacre, who escape to Florida dresed as women in an all-girl musical band. Also in the band is Sugar (Monroe), also escaping her past life, who becomes the love interest of Joe/Josephine (Curtis). Jerry/Daphne (Lemmon) also becomes the target of an admirer, in the form of eccentric millionaire, Osgood Fielding II, much to his annoyance. In an effort to woo Sugar, Joe adopts another alter-ego, Junior, heir to the Shell Oil company. Daphne is eventually convinced by Osgood to marry him. When things finally start to look good for Joe and Jerry, the gangsters arrive and the pair must try to escape without being caught. After several comedic chases, the duo escape down to the pier to Osgood, who is waiting for them. Having realised that Josephine and Junior are the same person, Sugar also goes to the pier and leaves with them.

While generally considered a comedy film, it also has aspects of romantic and gangster films. It was one of few films that went against the censorship rules at the time and contributed to its removal. The film also contains several songs sung by Monroe's character, Sugar. These fit into the plot well as the characters are portraying members of an all-girl musical band in an effort to hide from the gangsters. The film is generally considered a comedy classic and achieved first place on the American Film Institute's 100 Years... 100 Laughs list as well as placing 14th on the AFI 100 Years... 100 Quotes with the final line of the film, after the main characters have escaped with Daphne/Jerry's (Lemmon) millionaire admirer, Osgood Fielding III, who proposed to Daphne earlier in the film, Jerry desperately tries to convince Osgood that they cannot marry before giving up and revealing he is actually a man, Osgood simply replies, "Well, nobody's perfect".

Most films I watch are on TV or a DVD played on my PS3. I used to regularly go to the cinema but have only been a handful of times in the past few years. I don't have a favourite cinema as I haven't been to one for a almost a year, but I used to go to Hollywood Cinema in Anglia Square often. I don't have a preference for watching films alone or in a group as I've done a mixture of both.

Conclusion:
I dislike the majority of mainstream "popular" music acts because I see them as generic and unoriginal. I also think the use of technology to alter voices is wrong and often sounds worse than the artists normal voice. There isn't anything in the media that stands out as altering my attitude towards anything as I tend not to go with the popular opinion but rather choose my own based on my experiences. If I were asked to create a media text to inform people about something I deem important, I would use an online article as it would be the easiest to access to a large number of people. I chose to do Media Studies as I am interested in some aspects of the media industry and wanted to find out more about those aspects.